Kulychenko Mykhailo and Hrunia

Mykhailo Kulychenko and his wife Hrunia lived in the village of Vorontsovo-Horodyshche (current Horodyshche), Kyiv region. In September 1942, the couple harbored Biana Maksymenko and her little daughter Tetiana in their house. The Maksymenko family initially lived in Lviv, but decided to flee to the East after the outbreak of the war. Therefore, they found themselves in the Medzhybizh ghetto in the Kamianets-Podilskyi region (current Khmelnytskyi region). They were the prisoners there until September 1942, when the husband of Biana, the Ukrainian, secretly took them from there to the house of the Kulychenko family. Then he returned to Medzhybizh and joined the underground. Later he was caught and executed.

Biana and her daughter had been hiding in Kulychenko's house for six months. The village was located along the big road, that is why there were always many Germans and the risk of exposure was serious. So, the family of Kulychenko asked their relative Maria Ruzhyna and she took the Jews to the neighboring village of Khlystunivka by carriage.

For nearly half a year Biana Maksymenko and her daughter had been hiding in the basement of Ruzhyna’s house or in the attic. When the neighbors asked her about the child who suddenly appeared in the house, she answered that she was her niece from Kyiv. When the fear of exposure became too big, Maria took the escapees from Khlystunivka by the same carriage to the far hamlet, where another relative lived – Melania Kozachenko.

Until the elimination of the Nazis from the region in February 1944, Biana and Tetiana had been hiding in the house of Melania. After the war, they went to Latvia and stayed in touch with their saviors for many years.

/

On May 31, 1999, Yad Vashem recognized Mykhailo and Hrunia Kulychenko, Maria Ruzhyna and Melania Kozachenko as the Righteous Among the Nations.